Romans 5:17

Romans 5:17. For if. A confirmation of Romans 5:16, yet an advance of thought

By the fall (or, ‘trespass') of the one. A briefer reading: ‘in one trespass,' is found in good authorities, but the longer reading is now clearly established.

Death reigned through the one, i.e. , Adam. The repetition is probably to prepare for the triumphant close of the verse, contrasting the two persons. The correspondence between the clauses is in other respects not exact.

Much more. Here certainly not numerical: if this was God's way of justice, with much more certainty will His way of grace be, as is now described.

They who receive the abundance of the grace. The change of form brings into the foreground the persons who are the subjects of grace. With ‘the trespass of the one' is contrasted the abundance of the grace as bestowed on, and accepted by, living persons.

The gift of righteousness. ‘Righteousness' is ‘the gift,' righteousness imputed.

Shall reign in life through the one, Jesus Christ ‘In life' is to be taken in its fullest sense; this is the sphere in which those who receive the abundance of the grace shall reign. The whole clause has a triumphant tone, pointing from present grace to future glory, all mediated through the one, Jesus Christ. This is the emphatic side of the contrast. If, as a fact, sin and death were through Adam, then much more certain is it that abundant present grace and triumphant future glory shall be through our one head, Jesus Christ.